Black Star
by oceangirl1998
Summary: Years after her mother suddenly dies in a terrifying car crash, Bella Hartley discovers an old journal her mother used to have in high school. What shocking secrets will she discover, and what danger awaits for Bella right around the corner?
1. Prologue

**Hi everyone ;) So this is a new story I'm trying to write, I just got the idea a few days ago. This story is kind of based off a song I heard, it's called "Black Star" by Avril Lavigne. If you guys haven't heard it yet you should! It's a short song but I really love it, especially the remixed version! And it's kind of the "theme song" for this story. I have some really good ideas for this story so please review and tell me if you like it or not! ;)**

**Note: I do not own Avril Lavigne's song "Black Star". She and whoever else does. **

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><p>"Mummy, I can't sleep," 4-year-old Bella Hartley admitted as she walked into the living room.<p>

"Again, Bella?" her 24 year old mother, Sara, kindly asked her. Sara got off the couch, kneeled in front of Bella, and looked into her sparkling light blue eyes.

"Mm-hmm," Bella said, swaying back in forth holding on to her favorite pink teddy bear.

"Well, we should fix that, shouldn't we?" Sara said, showing off her perfectly white teeth with a smile.

"Yeah!" Bella exclaimed, giggling and revealing a smile. Sara smiled too, pushing her wavy, long blonde hair out of her face. She grabbed onto Bella's hand and they went upstairs to Bella's room.

Bella climbed onto her bed settled down underneath the blankets. Right outside her large window was a beautiful view of the waves crashing on the wet, sandy shore. A cloudless, dark, star filled sky and bright, full moon shone above the Irish coast.

Bella's mother sat in a rocking chair next to her bed. "Why can't you sleep, honey?" she asked her daughter, who was staring out the window.

"I don't know; guess I'm not really tired." Bella continued staring out the window, not really paying attention.

Sara sighed, and then thought of something. "You know, when I was little like you, I had trouble sleeping at night, too."

"Really?" Bella asked.

"Yup," Sara replied. "I, uh, used to dream of swimming in the ocean at night. You know, exploring the coral reefs and seeing all the beautiful fish. I loved to do it so much that I couldn't fall asleep at night." That was all she said, being very careful not to reveal anything about a secret she had been keeping from her daughter.

"Wow, sometimes I think about that too!" Bella laughed. Every night, when she went to bed, she'd walk up the long staircase to her room which was in a tall tower, the highest point of her house. Bella would silently stare out at the ocean and the stars, wondering what was really out there. It literally amazed her.

"That's great honey!" Sara said. "Do you know what finally got me to sleep at night?"

"No, what?" Bella curiously asked.

"My mother, your grandma, would come in and sing to me. I know it sounds kind of weird, but it really worked."

"Cool. Can you sing to me, Mummy? I know you're a really good singer." Bella said after a few moments. It was true, Sara had been singing for years. She had competed in many talents shows and contests, had gotten first place in tons of them, and could play just about every instrument there was! She was also a very creative songwriter.

"Oh, I don't know Bella…" Sara thought over.

"Please Mummy!" Bella started bouncing up and down on her bed, her long, curly blonde hair flying everywhere. "Please, please, please!"

"Okay, okay! You win!" Sara laughed and smiled.

"Yay!" Bella clapped and cheered.

"Alright, so listen to me young lady. Don't make fun of me, 'cause I'm not the best singer."

"Yes you are," Bella argued.

Sara cautiously began after Bella quieted down.

"_Black Star, Black Star…" _She softly sang.

"_Forever you will be…_

_A shining star, shining star_

_Be whatever you can be._

"_A rock star, rock star._

_You will always be…_

_A black star, black star, black star…_

_Black star, black star, black star…" _

"That was so pretty, Mummy," Bella murmured when she was done, sinking lower into the blankets on her bed.

"Thanks sweetie," Sara said, smiling at the comment.

"What's a black star? I thought all the stars were white," Bella asked. Every time when she looked at the stars, she always saw a bright, white sparkle, never anything black, except for the night sky.

Her mother sighed, trying to remember. She didn't want to put too many thoughts into Bella's head, even though it was all true.

"Every night there's a full moon," she started, "and the stars are shining bright with cloudless skies, a mermaid can watch the sky for hours, looking for shooting stars."

Sara hesitated for a moment, looking into Bella's big, blue, curious eyes that said she wanted to hear more. Should she really be telling her this? Well, she was bound to hear it eventually, wasn't she?

"You know what shooting stars are, don't you Bella?" Sara asked.

"Yeah, I heard if you see one and make a wish, your wish will come true!" Bella pronounced enthusiastically.

"Well that's mostly true. But when mermaids look for shooting stars, it can only be on very special nights, when it's a full moon, like I said before."

"Why only when it's a full moon?" Bella asked.

Sara hesitated again. If she said too much, things could really get out of control. You never know what might happen if you accidently blurt out one little thing.

"Uhh, well, I don't know…that's just how it is. I guess it only works if it's a full moon." Sara bit her lip. Bella looked unconvinced. She knew there was something her mother wasn't telling her.

Sara quickly moved on. "Mermaids can secretly watch the sky forever on full moon nights. They look everywhere for a very bright shooting star. Whenever a mermaid sees one and makes a wish, they know it will come true if the shooting star instantly turns black and disappears."

"Whoa cool! I wish I was a mermaid! It would be so awesome for all my wishes to come true!" Bella exclaimed and giggled.

"Well, Bella, if every single wish you ever made came true, you'd turn into a real spoiled little girl!" Sara teased her.

"No I wouldn't!" Bella yelled in protest. Her mother just laughed.

"I'm just kidding Bella, but you know that you can't get everything you want. Neither can the mermaids, so every wish they make on a shooting star will only come true if what they're wishing for is really important." Sara informed.

Bella just crossed her arms and sighed.

"So, are you tired now?" Bella's mother asked.

"Yeah, I guess." Sara got up out of the rocking chair and hugged Bella.

"Good night Bella," she said, giving her a kiss.

"'Night Mummy. That was a really pretty song you sang. I'll remember it forever!" Bella said returning the hug and kiss. "I love you!"

"Love you too," Sara said, leaving the room and walking down the stairs. Was Bella suspicious of something? She sighed loud as she walked into her bedroom. Sara was a single mother raising a 4 year old. No wonder why she was so tired!

She quickly changed into her pajamas and climbed into bed. Talking about the ocean and the stars earlier that night with Bella had really given her some good memories. Back when she was a teenager, Sara had spent hours swimming in the ocean, exploring just about every inch of it! She'd also spent almost every second of her teenage years out swimming with her friends and hanging with her boyfriend, Bella's future father.

"I wish I was still a mermaid," Sara blurted out loud. "Where did that come from?" she wondered. "Why would I still want to be a mermaid? Having to hide yourself from everyone around you, terrified of one drop of water falling on you and transforming in public, keeping your life a secret from your family…" Tears started filling Sara's eyes as she turned over on her side and wiped them.

"No, you made a decision to give up your powers and you did it. What's done is done." She sighed. "Too bad it was the wrong decision." And with that Sara drifted off into a long, restless sleep.

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><p><strong>Well, what did you think? This was just a prologue, so the whole story is focused mostly on something else, but this part was still a very important part of it. Sorry if there's some stuff wrong with it. I'm not a very experienced writer so I'm trying my best. And if I haven't said so already:<strong>

**PLEASE REVIEW! ;) ;) ;) ;) ;) THANK YOU! ;) ;) ;) ;) ;)**


	2. Back to Ireland

_15 years later_

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Bee- SMACK! 19 year Bella Hartley hit her alarm clock off. She sat up and heaved a long sigh while rolling her eyes. It was Saturday. Most teens LOVE Saturday, but now that she was a "legal adult" as her dad calls it, she had to work around the house today. Bella glanced over at her alarm clock and in big red numbers it read 7:32 a.m.

"UHHHH!" Bella groaned. 7:32 a.m. on a Saturday? This was torture! She wasn't used to waking up so early since school had been over for a while. Bella sighed again, grabbed a towel, some clothes, and headed into the bathroom. As soon as she locked the door, Bella slid her pajamas off and filled the bathtub with water. When the tub was full, she got in. 10 seconds or so later, she felt the familiar tingling feeling in her legs and watched as a long, shining, golden orange mermaid tail appeared. This had been going on for a while now, but Bella was still amazed every time it happened.

Then she realized something. In 3 days, it would be 10 years since she had become a mermaid.

"Wow," Bella breathed. "It's been that long? I can't believe it." Suddenly a feeling came over her. Bella was confused for a moment, but then a thought crossed her mind. She had to see that Irish moon pool again, the one that had changed her. She didn't know why, but she just felt she had to.

After about an hour, Bella was all dried off, dressed, and ready to go down stairs. She had lived with her dad since she was around 11, shortly after her mum's car accident. Thinking about her death still brings tears to her eyes every time Bella thinks about it. As soon as she found out that her mum was gone, she had sworn to herself never to think about it again, but Bella didn't think she could keep that promise much longer.

"Morning, dad," Bella said as she walked into the kitchen.

"Hi Bella," her dad, Jeff, said. "You ready to get to work around the house today?"

"If I have to," she replied.

"Good to hear, 'cause here's the list." Her dad picked up a list of chores at least 2 feet taller than Bella was! She gasped and her jaw dropped open as her dad unrolled the list so the beginning of it stood above her head.

"Dad, that's not fair! There's like a million things to do on here! The house can't be that dirty!" Bella exclaimed grabbing the list from him. "Why do we have to live in such a big house," she muttered.

Her dad walked across the kitchen, picked his briefcase off the counter, and put some papers in it. "Our house isn't that big," he argued. "And yes, it is that dirty." He closed the briefcase and hurried over to the computer to look up something.

"But dad, I have a life too, you know! This is going to take hours to finish," Bella groaned, setting the list aside.

"I've told you this before Bella, you have to learn how to take care of things on your own, and that means cleaning. You have to know how to do all this stuff before you go to college and get married," Jeff said, eyes glued to the monitor.

"But I already know how to do it all!" Bella complained. She walked over into the living room and plopped onto a leather couch. She took out her iPhone and checked to see if there were any messages.

"Practice makes perfect!" he hollered to Bella from the computer.

"Nooo," she sighed. Well, there was another weekend gone down the drain.

Jeff got up from the computer and sat next to Bella on the couch. "Uh, listen Bella. Do you remember the house you and your mum lived at in Ireland?"

Bella glanced up from her iPhone. She got this sick, nervous feeling in her stomach. As soon as he said that, a flood of memories cluttered her head. Before she moved when she was 11, that house was Bella's most favorite place in the world. Everything was just so magical and amazing there, especially after she turned into a mermaid. Around every corner, there was always another mystery. Bella smiled for a second at the memories, but it quickly faded when she looked over at her dad, who was waiting for a response.

"Y-Yeah, why?" Bella stuttered a little.

"Well, you know the house and the property has been up for sale for a while and someone has finally decided to buy it."

"Really?" she asked in disbelief. Who would want to buy that place? Sure, it pretty big and right on the coast, but that house was really run down, even when she lived there. Bella couldn't imagine what it looked like now.

"Apparently. And I just got an email saying that there are some old packages or boxes that used to belong to your mother and were left behind," Jeff said.

Bella noticed that he looked a little uneasy as he spoke. Sara's death was very sudden, and it had shaken up everyone who'd known her. Bella's parents had been married once, and that was when Sara was around 4 or 5 months pregnant with her. They separated when Bella was around 2. She never knew whatever happened between them, any time she'd ever asked their response was that they didn't get along or they'd fought a lot. That's what her parents said when Bella was still a kid, but she still sensed there was more to it than that.

"Well are we going to get the packages from the house?" she asked.

"If we were going to get them back, we'd have to go all the way to Ireland to get them, they wouldn't send the packages over here," he said. "Either we go get them or they'll just through them out or something like that."

"What! We can't just let them throw all those boxes out! Can't we go get them?" Bella was panicking now.

Not much of her mother's stuff had been saved, just some clothes, pictures, and a few important papers. If she could get her mother's left over boxes, Bella might be able to discover some of the mystery of why her parents had divorced, maybe even more.

"Oh, I don't know, Bella. I've just got so much going on…"

"But dad we have to! It's mum's stuff! You can't just let them throw her things away!" Bella protested.

"I'm sorry honey, but you know how much work I have to do. I'm not sure if there'd be any time."

"Aww, dad!" Of course. The answer with dad is always "no". Suddenly she got an idea. "Well what if I went over to Ireland and got mum's stuff on my own?" She bit her lip. Jeff wasn't the kind of dad that let Bella just go anywhere or do anything whenever she wanted. Ever since she'd lived with him, she'd had curfews of 9:00 p.m., 10:00 p.m., 11:00 p.m., and 12:00 a.m., all changing as Bella got older. She also had a LOT of rules to follow.

"Go all the way over there on your own? I don't think so," her dad said getting up from the couch and walking back to the computer. Bella followed him.

"What, don't you trust me? Dad, I'm 19, even you said I'm a 'legal adult'. I'm old enough to just go to Ireland, grab some stuff, and come back. How long would it take, like a week? Less than that?"

"Listen, it's not that easy. There's a lot of things that could go wrong," he tried explaining. But Bella wasn't listening.

"Dad, I've flown in an airplane tons of times, and I know how to get by on my own. I'd be back again before you'd even realize I was gone," she argued.

"All by yourself?" her dad asked.

"Not if you don't want me to be. Oh, I know! Maybe I could bring Will!" Bella suggested. She might've brought Rikki or Cleo, but Cleo was on a trip with her family for 2 weeks and Rikki had her own stuff going on.

"Will, your boyfriend?" he nervously asked.

"Yeah, I don't think he has anything big happening any time soon," she thought over. Will would be up for anything like that, he's been everywhere, and loves traveling.

"If it really means that much to you, then sure," Jeff said.

"Oh, thank you daddy, thank you, thank you, thank you!" Bella hugged him and smiled as wide as she could.

"Wait a second. You know you still have to clean the house," he said.

"I know," she answered.

"And, since you guys are the ones who are going, you have to pay for your own plane tickets."

"Aww, I knew there'd be a catch to this," Bella groaned, walking back over to the couch.

"Well you didn't think I was going to pay for two plane tickets, did you?" her dad asked.

"No…" Bella said, turning her head away from him.

"You can afford it, can't you?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Good, now, get to work on those chores. I have a meeting to go to now," Jeff said, logging off the computer and grabbing his briefcase.

"'Kay, see you," Bella said good-bye as he walked out of the house and got in the car. It was around 9:00 a.m. now. Her dad wouldn't be back until around 2, so that leaves 5 hours for chores.

She sighed. "I'll do them later," Bella said and ran outside after folding up the long list of chores and putting them in her pocket.

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><p>"Hey Will!" she said as she walked out to the docks where he was trying to fix his boat.<p>

"Oh, hey Bella," Will said as he worked on the motor.

"How would you like to go to Ireland with me?" Bella enthusiastically asked him.

"What do mean?" Will stopped working on his boat for a second to listen to her.

"Well, okay so this is kind of a long story but just let me say this: there are some left over packages that used to belong to my mum before she died and were left in our old house back in Ireland. I really want to go back over there and get them back before the new owners move in, since the house was just bought."

"Wow, that's quite a story Bella," Will said, still trying to process what she just told him.

"I know and my dad just barely agreed to let me go. Do you want to come with me?" she hopefully asked him.

"Yeah sure, I think that'd be really cool," Will answered with a smile.

"Awesome!" Bella smiled. "We'll figure out the rest of the stuff later."

"Sounds good." Will replied. "Now, let's see if this piece of junk works."

Will climbed back into his boat, covered the motor back up, and started up the engine. At first it didn't do anything, but after a few tries it finally worked. The boat sped ahead way too fast though, spinning out of control and almost causing Will to crash into the other end of the dock. He stopped it in time, but not before covering Bella from head to toe in a sheet of water.

"UHH, WILL!" she screamed and fell to the floor of the wooden dock as a mermaid. Will immediately rushed over to where she was laying.

"Uh, sorry Bella," he nervously laughed. "I told you that boat was a piece of junk." Will smirked.

Bella looked up at him and gave him a death glare. She blew some hair out of her face, then reached over to where Will was kneeling, pushed him off the edge of the dock, and watched him fall into the water! Ha, now that was funny!

She hysterically laughed as Will floated to the surface and frowned. "Thanks a lot, Bella," Will sighed and climbed into his boat dripping wet.

"Sure, anytime!" Bella laughed and let the sun dry herself off.

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><p><strong>What did you think of this chapter? I know it's not the most exciting one but it's necessary for the story. I'm really sorry if there's some mistakes with this. Nothing is more embarrassing for me then finding mistakes in a chapter that's already been published! Oh and I want to thank you guys so much for the reviews! I also love it when you ask questions about the story in them. It does give me something to think about. Please review! ;) ;)<strong>


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